Dear Everyone,
Nepal Festival 2008 in Melbourne on Sunday was a resounding success. I am struggling to put this into words how much it meant for every single Nepali who was there to be part of this historical moment for our community. Fed Square estimated the peak crowd to be around 7-8 thousand and would easily have been more than 10 thousand throughout the day. 7000 at one time was beyond our wildest dream.
Our community is small and rapidly emerging community, but extremely passionate about our rich cultural heritage and that love and passion was there to be seen and felt during the festival. You could just feel the aura, it was that powerful. Yesterday was the one of the proudest moment since I came to Melbourne 15 years ago and I know it was the case for a lot of people.
I would like to take this moment to express my sincere thanks and gratitude to all of you for your tireless work and priceless contribution. Thank you to all of you who came all the way to Melbourne to provide us with moral support and help us to organize this festival and be part of this historic moment.
Fed Square management was highly impressed with the quality of our festival. They commented that they don’t have this sort of festival with so much passion on display too often. It is a huge complement for our community. The festival meant a lot to many people who was there to witness it - one person was moved to tears when he saw Nepali flag on the poles of federation square, another student said he has had identity crisis ever since he has been to Australia and being part of the festival gave him ‘I am proud Nepali’ feeling back.
Can you please convey my special thanks to all the artist bhai bahini haru and everyone else who worked behind the scene to make this happen?
Yours in Solidarity,
Raju Shakya
Nepal Festival 2008 Melbourne Organizing Committee
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